Keir Starmer speech at the BCC Global Annual Conference 2023

Keir Starmer, leader of the Labour Party, speech at the British Chambers of Commerce Global Annual Conference, QEII Centre, London

Thank you Shevaun for inviting me here today to speak about Labour’s plans for our economy, a plan that can be summed up in just one word: growth.

I’m serious – that’s it. In this job you get to see a lot of the country. You’re on the road every week so I know we have enormous problems, in our economy and our communities.

But honestly, it is obvious to me that the root cause of so many of our challenges is a lack of economic growth.

I know what a lot of people in Westminster say about growth. They say it’s an abstract concept, doesn’t resonate, doesn’t connect with peoples’ lives, I don’t accept that.

Growth is higher wages. Growth is stronger communities. Growth is thriving businesses. It’s more vibrant high street, less poverty, more opportunity, warmer homes, healthier food, better jobs.

It’s public services that are well funded. It’s holidays, meals out, more cash in your pocket – an end to the suffocating cost of living crisis, our ticket to win the race for the future and the biggest single thing we need to lift our sights, raise our ambitions, and get our hope, our confidence and our future back.

If we’re elected, we’ll approach this with a new mind-set, a new purpose and a new approach to governing.

We will be driven by five clear missions – measurable missions, missions that embrace the challenge of clear accountability, set a focused direction and bring the whole country together to move us forward.

So our economic mission, our goal on growth, the target we’ll put in the next Labour manifesto, is this: in the next Parliament, Britain will have the highest sustained growth in the G7.

It’s ambitious I know, I make no apologies for it. The highest sustained growth in the G7 – that should draw a sharp intake of breath.

And yes I am aware of the headwinds. We’ve got to navigate our way through revolutions in technology, in energy, in medicine and, with an ageing society, even in who we are.

Climate change is a recipe for global instability. The shape of power in the world is changing, there is war on our continent. Because of all of this, we must square up to a new economic era.

Where the old assumptions – on labour, on energy, on trade and goods – no longer apply.

No doubt about it – your company risk registers will be long, I know that, but the way I see it – there are also opportunities to be seized, new markets to open up, a more prosperous future that can be won.

Take net zero and the green industries of tomorrow. A new global market of up to one trillion pounds. But, of course, a competitive market where countries – all around the world, not just in the US – are setting a new tempo, a dash for green growth.

We’ve got to be on the pitch. This is the biggest opportunity to make our country work for working people we’ve had in decades.

It’s no good carping from the side-lines. Holding on to an outdated economic logic as the rest of the world eats our lunch. Some nation is going to design medicines personalised to match our unique DNA, why not this one?

Some nation will create the first generation of quantum computers, why not us?

Some nation will lead the world in offshore wind, why not Britain?

I’ll tell you one reason why not, our planning system.

I met the people running the National Grid recently and you know what they said to me, they said: if we want to get anywhere near our goals on net zero, we need to build more infrastructure in the next seven years, than we have in the last 30.

Let that sink in.

And yet – what’s the average time it takes to build an offshore wind far? 13 years… an entire Tory government.

And now housebuilding – crashing to a record low. Onshore wind – just two turbines built last year.

Critical infrastructure like HS2, built more slowly and expensively because of the red tape.

And the net result, an economy stuck in second gear. A doom-loop of low growth, low productivity and high taxes. A generation and its hopes, an entire future – blocked by those, who more often than not, enjoy the secure homes and jobs that they’re denying to others.

The evidence could not be clearer, there are 38 countries in the OECD, and we are the second worst when it comes to the effectiveness of our planning system.

And just think – some people still call our problems the “productivity puzzle”. We know the problems – we’ve just got to show a bit more bottle to fix them.

I mean – I listened to the Prime Minister over the despatch box recently burying his head in the sand on this issue, playing to the Tory gallery. That’s just not serious.

You can’t be serious about raising productivity, about improving the supply-side capacity of our economy, about arresting our economic decline, without a plan for the windfarms, the laboratories, the warehouses and the homes this country so desperately needs.

That doesn’t work for Britain, it doesn’t work for business, it doesn’t work for growth – and I won’t accept it.

Because there’s nothing that reeks more of decline than the idea that this country no longer knows how to build things.

So mark my words: we will take on planning reform.

We’ll bring back local housing targets.

We’ll streamline the process for national infrastructure projects and commercial development and we’ll remove the veto used by big landowners to stop shovels hitting the ground.

Tough choices, but the right choices. Choices we make with our eyes wide open.

We choose the builders, not the blockers. The future, not the past. Renewal, not decline.

We choose growth.

And there’s a bigger lesson here, as well. In this new, more volatile economic era, businesses need a government that gets involved.

There’s no future in a stand-aside state. That won’t deliver the stability and the certainty, won’t manage the tide of change that is coming.

It’s simple really: every business in this room has a strategy for growth, a nation needs one too.

That’s not a return to the mistakes of the past – we’ve got to get over that hangover. In every one of our competitors, industrial policy is the bread and butter of responsible economic management, about what the state does, not how big it is.

How it can support businesses of all sizes to innovate and grow, can bring in the creative brilliance of our scientists and universities, can work with trade unions, and bring you all together, to unleash the potential of our strengths.

Our cutting edge technology sector, our superpower services, life sciences that save lives.

It’s a shared undertaking that is not state control or pure free markets, but a genuine partnership, sleeves rolled-up, working for the national interest.

This is fundamental to my politics. I believe in the power of dynamic government.

But I also believe in the brilliance of British business and I’ve changed my Labour Party to reflect that.

We’re not just a pro-business party, we’re a party that is proud of being pro-business, that respects the contribution profit makes to jobs, growth and our tax base, gets that working people want success as well as support. Understands that robust private sector growth is the only way we pay our way in the world.

I’ve also got to be clear, we hold our hand out in partnership, but we do it with an uncompromising purpose. The purpose that shapes everything we want to achieve in government – all five of our national missions.

That is to change this country, so it once again respects, serves and delivers for working people.

We’re going to tip the scales away from the vested interests that have held our businesses and our economy back for too long.

The blockers, the stiflers, those who are comfortable with Tory stagnation and failure, they aren’t going to give up without a fight – that’s not how change happens.

But these past 13 years, what working people have been through, what businesses have been through – nearly record numbers of small businesses going under, every one a personal tragedy, an ambition, a dream, an investment in a better future – gone.

All this, it has to be a turning point.

Britain needs a new business model and changing a business model is hard, you get that.

It requires mission, purpose, determination. Openness and partnership – absolutely.

But it also requires hard choices. So, I want to set out five priorities, five key economic shifts that will underpin our mission for growth.

The building blocks of our strategy to lead Britain out of its low growth, high tax, doom-loop.

Shift one – from chaos to certainty. The rock of economic stability that must underpin everything that we do. This is why you need a government that gets involved, that takes active, strategic decisions, it’s the only way to provide real certainty in this era.

Investors in this country need a clear framework that holds for the long-term, with policies that are always fully costed.

Fiscal rules, sound and followed rigorously. Institutions, respected not bypassed. All our aspirations must be built on this, don’t doubt us for a second.

But honestly – the way I see it, stability is the least the British people should expect. Britain needs certainty, yes, but also change.

So – shift two. We must move from an economy that hoards potential, to one that unlocks it everywhere.

Communities need to be in charge of their economic destiny. Growth comes from the grassroots, and it must provide secure, well-paid jobs in all areas of the country.

Britain is far too centralised – and this hurts us economically. A politics that hoards power, goes hand-in-hand with an economy that hoards potential – I’m utterly convinced by that.

So we will give the communities and nations of this country the right powers to drive private sector growth, and to get their high streets growing again, new powers for councils to take over empty retail units.

And – yes, we will level the playing field with the online warehouses, we will scrap and replace business rates.

Shift three – Britain must go from lagging to leading. Must get on the pitch in science, technology, green growth and the opportunities of tomorrow. That’s why we need a reformed planning system, a modern industrial strategy, a more powerful British business bank that will help scale businesses – new and old.

And why we need a Government that won’t sit on the side-lines. That will invest for, train people for, crowd-in finance for, scale-up supply chains for, reform procurement for, has a plan for, the green jobs and cheaper energy of the future.

That will use every tool at our disposal to make sure Britain becomes a superpower in green growth.

Shift four – we’ve got to stop creating insecure work and thinking: job done. Nobody here would be happy with a job that didn’t provide security or respect, so neither should we be happy with an economic model that demands this from working people, and that isn’t fair to businesses doing the right thing.

This is absolutely critical for us.

We don’t see a labour market that locks in low pay and productivity as beyond reform. We see it as an opportunity to finally make work pay for millions, that’s why we’ll offer more flexible skills funding: a reformed apprenticeship levy, a modernised childcare system and a new deal on employment rights that we know the Tories will attack in the usual way.

There isn’t a single advance for workers in this country that they haven’t resisted but we are here to restore the Labour Party to its purpose of serving working people.

And we think categorically, that this will be good for growth.

Shift five – our economy must become more resilient to global shocks. And we must be more open to global trade.

This cannot be a choice. That might work in the seminar room, or in the political arena, but it doesn’t work for businesses trying to export.

So we’ve got to use levers like procurement creatively, nurture more resilient supply chains, and fix the Brexit deal.

We’ve got to project a more open stance to the world. Believe me – I know how important this is. Global standing has to be earned, not taken for granted, nobody owes us a future.

When the big questions are asked, around conference tables all round the world: “where do we put out money”, “where do our jobs go”, “where does our investment in a better future go”, we have to make sure the answer that comes back is a resounding: why not Britain?

That’s what our mission is about. That’s why we need more growth, and I want everyone here to know: we are ready to take on that challenge and we will deliver.

I know, because I see more and more people lining up shoulder to shoulder with Labour.

Businesses, crying out for a government that backs them to grow.

Working people, desperate for an economy that puts their interests first. Everyone from scientists to pipe-fitters, data engineers to plumbers, a union of the willing – impatient to build a better Britain.

That’s the businesses, the builders, the British public. Together, no less than the backbone of our economy. The backbone of our country – in partnership. The backbone of our country – united in their hope for a better future.

With that backbone supporting us, we can unlock Britain’s untapped opportunities, we can renew our country, can go for growth and build a better Britain.

Thank you.

Ends